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A group of masked gunmen stormed a popular bar in the Mexican city of Chihuahua late Friday, killing 15 people, including two journalists, state prosecutors said Saturday.

At least 10 suspects entered the Colorado Bar wearing what looked like police uniforms and opened fire on the crowd inside the bar, according to Carlos Gonzalez, a spokesman for the Chihuahua state attorney general's office. Eleven people died at the scene, and the other four died en route to the hospital.

The victims ranged in age between 25 and 72. Among them was Hector Javier Aguirre Salinas, the owner of a news website and a respected journalist. A second journalist, Francisco Javier Moya -- who in years past had served as the news director for a radio station in Ciudad Juarez -- also was killed.

"The crime of our partners and the rest of those killed in the attack, cannot go unpunished," Roberto Delgado, president of the Association of Journalists in Juarez, said in a statement on the killings.

Prosecutors said they collected at least 30 shell casings from a variety of weapons, including several bullet casings from an AK-47.

Northern Mexico has been ravaged by battles among rival drug cartels, police and government troops for the past several years. More than 47,000 people have been killed since the Mexican government launched a crackdown on drug traffickers in December 2006, according to government statistics.